#*dreamy sigh* ''i want to study you under a microscope :)''

[lieutenantmongoose]

Verse Info: Good and Faithful (or, a polite haunting) 

The Story - 

( Good and Faithful, Codifier )      -     In which Jopson died just before the 1839 expedition. He tends to avoid discussion of how it actually happened, but in any case he had just accepted the stewardship position and had been counting on those wages to pay the doctor for his mother’s treatment, and needed to ensure that she and Avery would be reasonably comfortable in his absence.  

Being that he had neither time nor inclination to be dead, and truthfully not quite even realizing he was dead, Jopson simply collected himself and carried on as usual, under the impression that the whole incident was simply a minor dizzy spell.

The issue, of course, with continuing to pilot one’s corporeal form with a severed connection between body and ghost, is that it’s somewhat akin to clutching a bedsheet in front of yourself while standing outside in a hurricane. And in addition to keeping hold of that bedsheet, you also have to hang up the rest of the laundry on the lines, and avoid letting your neighbors see that you’re out in a hurricane in nothing but a bedsheet still trying to finish your laundry, because odds are your neighbors will have Questions about this type of behavior. 

Fortunately, Jopson had always been quick to catch on to things so it was with only a minor bout of sudden collapses and fits of uncharacteristic clumsiness that he mostly got the hang of the situation before setting sail, and for the most part was able to avoid any trouble. 

Avoiding trouble lasted until a point about halfway through the expedition, when he very nearly frightened Captain Crozier into a similar state by forgetting to shiver. Or keep up a pulse. This almost led to a rather tender moment indeed as Crozier was quite unhappy to see him Dying, but this was abated by admitting to already having been quite dead from the beginning and thus unchanged in status despite what ought to have been a lethal case of hypothermia.

All in all, Crozier was actually rather more amenable to the idea of having a dead steward than he’d thought ten minutes prior, and all continued as normal. 

However

Once the Franklin Expedition begins

( Oh Dear, My Heart/The Moon Plays Host ) 

It turns out that keeping hold of the proverbial bedsheet is a lot more challenging under certain conditions, and there are only so many ‘fainting spells’ that can be got away with without arousing suspicion, and that the presence of a strange magic in the air tends to have interesting effects on ghosts improperly connected to the mortal plane.

It further turns out that this arrangement creates a bit of an impasse when faced with soul-devouring creatures. They are used to tackling a body and pulling the soul from it. The soul simply moving out of the way is not generally expected, and is regarded as highly inconvenient. 

Or, 

Jopson is a ghost during the Franklin Expedition, which is fine, except that improperly tethered ghosts start to get a little bit creature-y the longer they drift in seemingly-cursed landscapes trying to reject their souls like a bad transplant. Also, at night, Jopson can see the crew’s Dead still wandering the ice. 

[afewmarvelousthoughts]

Only For A Moment Ch. 23

Master List: @afewmarvelousthoughtsadmin

Pairing: Bucky X Reader

Summary: For most of your life you’d been able to keep your abilities a secret, that is until Hydra got wind of you. After years of being in their clutches, you break out when The Avengers expose SHIELD/Hydra. Since then, you’ve been on the run. Things are going as well as you could hope when you see a familiar face… Could the Winter Soldier really be in Bucharest too?

Warnings: Past physical violence (from childhood), homophobia, just... heavy. 

A/N: Uh... yeah... So some of you may remember me saying that I’m basically at the mercy of my characters. I’m just here to do the heavy lifting (or typing as it were). Well... this is one of those instances when that rings VERY true. Even when I thought this was going to be a smutty one shot I knew this bit of the backstory about the Reader OC. Let me tell ya... I was real mad about it. Tried to think of a way to not have it be a thing, maybe avoid telling it, and on and on. In the end though this experience shaped this character into who she is and it’s not really something I feel one would be able to avoid given the (literal) mark it left behind. 

All that being said the really traumatic bits are italicized. You can skip them if you want and still sort of get the gist of what happened. 

Tags are open!

@bluegirlusa1 @l0kisbitch @tazzi-baby @disagreetoagree @woodyandbuzz20-01 @mooniightbucky @soulless-and-sarcastic @saundrasays @breezy1415  @creepshowzombae  @alyssaj23 @mywinterwolf @wonderlandmind4 @fairislesheets @anamcg317 @buckaroo-barness  @jazztherebel @peachthatdrinkslemonade @regulusirius @auskitty @babyimp1967

“Are you ok, Bucky?” In response, he lifts his head and kisses you turning you so the water runs down your back warming you.

When his eyes meet yours there’s no darkness there. “I’m great,” he smiles softly and rests his forehead against your own for a minute. You both just stay in this cocoon of steam holding one another, your toes just barely touching the tub.

The water starts to cool a bit so you turn the stream off. Once out of the tub he grabs the towel from the hook and runs it over your damp face. He pecks the tip of your nose and begins to gently dry you. Your breath shudders as he places a kiss on every newly dry region of your body. At your back your eyes squeeze shut, the towel gently running over the latticework of scars, the feeling of his lips pressed between your shoulder blades simultaneously wonderful and horrible.

As he kneels drying your calves you snag the second towel and you playfully dry his hair. He peeks up from under the towel, grinning and you can’t stop the huge smile from covering your own face.

Pulling the towel from you he makes quick work of drying his own body. You openly gawk, entranced by the movements of the muscles under his skin and the fluidity of his actions for someone so bulky.

When he’s just about done he catches you watching, tosses the towel away and scoops you off the floor in one sweeping motion. You giggle loudly, unable to remember if anyone had ever actually swept you off your feet before.

As he lays you on the bed you switch all the lights off save the lamp by the couch. He lays on his side next to you resting on his left forearm. The blanket slides its way up the both of you. There’s a part of you that desperately wants more of him but you know that neither of you is ready for that, not right now.

For a while you mirror one another hands clasped just looking into the other’s eyes. Studying, memorizing, holding on to this.

“I’m glad you found me, Bucky,” you whisper. His eyes are glassy and maybe a little sad, as though he’s not sure you should be glad. You press your body next to his and he envelops you.

Neither of you really sleep. While the relief of earlier was excellent it opened wounds for you and sleep, you knew, would allow memories you didn’t want to creep out. You suspected it was the same for him. Instead, you both doze. Hands wandering lazily over the one another’s bodies, not sexually just enjoying being touched in tenderness and not pain.

Dawn begins to light the windows and you flick the lamp off, the muted light of early morning giving the room a dreamy feel. Bucky’s head is resting on the left side of your chest, his breathing steady as you softly run your nails up and down his back. His metal index finger runs down the thick rope-like scar that stretches from your back around to your collarbone.

“Bastards,” he whispers, almost inaudible.

“You’re not wrong but your rage is a little misdirected there.” He sits up a little looking at you and you give him a wan smile. His eyes shift from the scar to your eyes and back again. This was always the part you dreaded about intimacy. Questions would, inevitably, arise quickly with your lovers and it never took long. You couldn’t blame them, the scars were brutal even before your stint with Hydra. When curiosity and concern mix, they’re hard to ignore.  

“How…?”

You sigh, “Short version… mom’s pastor boyfriend whipped me to drive the devil from me.”

His eyes spark with something vicious, “Long version?”

“I’ll tell you if you want to know. It’s a fucking ugly story though.” With him it’s the first time you want to tell it, you know he won’t run away or stop you half way. He just nods, his brows knit in concern.

You take a deep breath, sit up leaning against the wall, and dive in, “So… my mom grew up very religious and when things were floating around her baby’s crib she fully thought I was possessed.” He snorts a little and you shake your head, “I’ve had damn near every kind of exorcism performed on me. She always said I was her penance for her sins.” Your eyes roll, “Whatever. Anyway, after she broke up with the guy in the town with the movie theatre we landed in this microscopic town in backwoods Louisiana. Of course, we got involved with the church and she got involved with the pastor.

“About a month after we moved in with him she and I got in a fight and things began to float and fling around, I didn’t have a ton of control over it then. He saw and of course, I’m immediately deemed ‘possessed.’ I had just turned 13 a few months before and I literally didn’t see the outside world until I was 14.”

“What the fuck?” Bucky’s voice is a rumble.

“Can’t let the demon child out now can we?” You try to joke, always trying to make it seem lighter than it was. “But yeah, it was a fucking nightmare.” You trace the scars on your wrists, “That’s when I did this. Then they decided maybe they could let me out for church.”

You take a shaky breath, “It was October, the church was throwing a ‘Fall Festival’ because of course, Halloween is from the devil,” Bucky’s eyes roll and you laugh, “I know. And this girl… Beth,” your voice cracks a bit, “she was my age, the first and only friend I had there. She was dressed like an angel and she looked so gorgeous to me with her strawberry hair and green eyes.” You shake your head, “I was dressed like a fucking farmer.” He laughs a bit. “She asked if I wanted to walk around together and of course I did.

“We ended up sneaking into the chapel, sitting in the baptismal with our candy just laughing and talking. She told me she liked my hair,” your hand absently runs over the fuzz you’re sporting now, “I told her I liked hers, and her eyes and her lips. And…” you touch your own lips at the memory, “She kissed me.”

You let your head fall back against the wall with a thud. “I was walking on air when I got home…  Someone saw Beth and I though… of course they told the fucking pastor. He bursts into my room in the middle of the night, literally drags me out of my bed, down the stairs, and out back to the barn.” Your eyes are closed fists clenched. “Mom’s screaming to know what’s happened, he says I let my evil taint an innocent young girl that I was toxic and vile and an abomination… I went wild, kicking and biting and screaming trying everything I could to get away from him. It was like that only convinced him I had the devil in me.” You pause, gathering yourself to finish.

“He hit me so hard I lost consciousness. When I came to my shirt was gone and I was hanging from my wrists. Mom was crying and he kept saying I was their responsibility, the lord was testing them… He actually had the gall to say that he was doing this because he loved me, it was gods love, he couldn’t spare the rod and lose my soul.” You touch the scar, “It wasn’t a rod though. It was a fucking whip.” You can still remember how it felt. Bucky seems to be holding his breath.

“Thirty-nine lashes.” He breathes out and you look at him, his face a mask of rage and horror. “They left me there, hanging bloody and sobbing. Before dawn, I got myself down, snuck into the house, stole all the money I could find, some sheets and a few shirts and a jacket from the laundry. Ran. I wrapped myself in strips of the sheets, layered on like 3 shirts and a jacket just hoping I wouldn’t bleed through it all. Got on a bus and went to New Orleans.” Your eyes sting with tears.

“Nix found me a few days later bloody and half dead, brought me back to life. I became a different person. Never saw my mom or that bastard again. But… Hydra… got them.” Bucky snorts as if to agree, for once, with their actions.

You’re not done though. “After Hydra found me again in Brooklyn after you got me out. I wouldn’t comply with anything. I had no reason to. Everyone I loved was gone and I thought they’d just kill me if I didn’t obey.”

“If only,” he whispers and you grab his hand, holding tight.

“Yeah, I figured that out fast enough. It didn’t take a genius to ascertain those scars were from something traumatic so they used it. Didn’t comply, whipped, beaten, raped. Still refuse, chair. Back and fo-“

“Chair?” His eyes are saucers. Terror is etched all over his face.

“… yeah…”